DHA619 Northcentral University Health Care Cyber Security Paper In a 4- to 5-page paper, identify and discuss the organization’s proposed action plan to de
DHA619 Northcentral University Health Care Cyber Security Paper In a 4- to 5-page paper, identify and discuss the organization’s proposed action plan to deal with this emerging trend (hospital cyber security). This is the fourth part of your final project and picks up where Module 3 left off. You will need to utilize at least 3-5 references.
The completed paper for this module should address the following issues:
1. What is the key message of your findings?
2. How are your results compared to other studies/literature?
3. What are the policy implications? Running head: HOSPITAL CYBER SECURITY
Hospital Cyber Security
Name
Institution
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Hospital Cyber Security
The increased use of technology in the healthcare sector in the United States of America
has enabled quality healthcare provision in the hospitals, however; cases of cyber attacks for
instance hacking of healthcare data has been on the rise as well. With the increased use of
internet technology in the hospitals, cybercriminals have found numerous avenues where they
can acquire medical data illegally and sale the data in the black market where people uses them
to conduct activities like medical frauds among many other illegal activities. It is essential to
understand that the breaches of healthcare data are an increasing threat in the current hospitals
and healthcare industry causing not only data loss and theft of money but also attacks on the
infrastructure and medical devices (Claunch & McMillan, 2013). The attacks on the hospital
information system and data cause many challenges to the transfer of information as well and
access to the patient information and at the end, affect the provision of quality healthcare in the
hospitals.
Hospitals are becoming the prey for the cybercriminals making cybersecurity a growing
concern. Recently, there are several reports concerning hospital data hacking and IT security
incidences in many hospitals in America forcing the majority of the health organization to
struggle towards defending their data and networks preventing the cyber attackers at bay. The
year 2015 was one of the worst years in America’s healthcare sector because the majority of the
hospitals experienced a data breach in one way or another (Jarrett, 2017). The attack on the
hospital information system as well as hospital data was rampant in the year 2015 than in the
previous six years combined. The attackers manage to stole or expose the patient information
healthcare plan and even interfered with the transfer of information from one point to another in
the process negatively affected the provision of quality healthcare in the health facilities. The
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number of health record affected by cybercriminals in the year 2015 was astonishing because
cyber attackers manage to affect approximately 113 million health records that year alone.
The number of cyberattacks seems to be increasing because even in the year 2016, the
number of reported cases of data breaches also increased meaning that the cyber attackers are
coming up with ingenious ways of accessing the hospital data despite the endless efforts of the
hospitals to protect their healthcare data against cybercriminals. The majority of healthcare
facilities manage to report the theft of healthcare records affecting the ability of the healthcare
providers to access the patient’s information, therefore, affecting their ability to provide quality
healthcare to the patients. With the increase in the number of cyberattacks in every year, it is
evident that the cyber attackers are becoming smart in carrying out their malicious activities and
therefore the healthcare sector should ensure that they develop more secure data storage and
management model in the hospitals that will help protect healthcare records from cyber attackers.
Protecting healthcare information is critical because it plays a significant role in determining the
type of healthcare that the patients will receive from a particular health facility.
Healthcare data breaches in the year 2017 seem to be another record-breaker because the
number of reported cases manages to increase significantly (Kruse, Frederick, Jacobson, &
Monticone, 2017). The increase in the cases of hospital data breaches sends a red alarm to the
healthcare industry not only in Seattle, Washington but also in all parts of the world where they
use internet technology in managing the healthcare information in the hospitals. It is high time
for the healthcare providers to secure internet-connected medical devices as well as health record
stores better than ever before. The primary reason for providing better protection of healthcare
data is that the trend of cyber attacks shows that the cybercriminals are developing new ways of
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retrieving healthcare information from the system and use them for their benefits at the expense
of the health facility and the lives of the patients in the hospitals.
The adoption of the new technologies in the management of healthcare information by
the health facilities also plays a significant role in increasing the criminal attack surface since the
cybercriminals find weaknesses in the data management system and develops tools and
techniques that enable them to acquire the information illegally from the system (Dogaru &
Dumitrache, 2017). The healthcare industry has been slow when responding to the issues to do
with cybersecurity in comparison to other sectors like a business. The health sector in America is
making promising steps in enhancing cybersecurity by increasing cybersecurity budget,
purchasing reliable technologies that are reliable in preventing the cases of cyber attacks as well
as keeping the information network secure in managing healthcare data. The effort by the
healthcare sectors leads to reduce the number of cases in the year 2018 in comparison to that of
the preceding years. The number of reported cases at this time of year is even less when
compared to the same time last year, meaning that the efforts to prevent cyber-attacks are bearing
fruits.
The statistical analysis from the data breaches in the health facilities in Seattle,
Washington shows that with the increase in the number of attacks is directly proportional with
the number of patients records affected and at the end affect the quality of healthcare delivery to
the patients. When the attackers encrypt or steal the patients’ healthcare records, the healthcare
providers cannot access the vital information that enables them to execute the treatment process
and in the process affect the delivery of quality healthcare in the facility. The findings show that
as the number of cyberattacks increases in the healthcare records, the patients’ records are the
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most affected and at the end negatively affect the provision of quality healthcare by the
healthcare providing facility.
The Chi-square test of significance also shows that there is a significant relationship
between the quality of healthcare and the security of patient healthcare information at the level of
significance being 0.6. The test reveals that when the patient healthcare records are more secure,
the patients are likely to receive quality healthcare in comparison to when the healthcare
information is prone to cyberattacks (Martin, Martin, Hankin, & Darzi, 2017). It is therefore
evident that healthcare providing facilities can improve the quality of healthcare provision to the
patients by ensuring that the facility protects the information of the patients’ against the
cybercriminals and enable secure and effective transfer of the data from one department to the
other within or outside the healthcare providing facility. The effective transfer of data from one
point to another not only enhances the provision of quality healthcare to the patients but also
provides a pleasant environment to the healthcare providing officers in the facility and at the end
further improve the quality healthcare delivery in the hospital.
Majority of the hospitals at 70% in the United States have put cybersecurity as the
priority in the management of data in the facilities; however, only 37% of the facilities perform
annual incidence response exercise (Sittig & Singh, 2016). Performing activities such as
incidence response play a critical role in ensuring that the healthcare providing facilities develop
new ways of handling cyberattacks at the end enables the healthcare providing facilities to
become resilient to cases of cyber attacks allowing them to deliver high quality healthcare
services to the patients. The cybersecurity capabilities of the hospitals can erode after some time,
and not all of them are self-sustaining. It is therefore vital for the health providing facilities to
ensure that they review their cybersecurity mechanisms to enable them to prevent cyber attacks
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and protect their information because it determines the quality of healthcare service they provide
to their patients.
Cybersecurity in hospitals plays a significant role in determining the provision of quality
healthcare to the patients as well as providing a pleasant working environment to the healthcare
providers in the healthcare providing facilities. The adoption of internet technology in healthcare
delivery has enabled the connection of medical devices as well as the transfer of the information
beneficial even though it exposes the system to the cyberattacks that affect the provision of
quality healthcare in the hospitals. The number of reported data breaches has been increasing,
becoming the highest in the year 2016, even more than the number of cases in six years
combined. It is essential for the hospitals to ensure that the information and data management
system is secure from the cyber attackers because the findings show that the quality of healthcare
provision is directly proportional to the security of patients’ information.
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References
Claunch, D., & McMillan, M. (2013). Determining the right level for your IT security
investment: a rural medical center facing threats of data breaches discovered that hospital
IT security investments go beyond just dollars and cents. Healthcare Financial
Management, 67(5), 100-104.
Dogaru, D. I., & Dumitrache, I. (2017). Cyber security in healthcare networks. E-Health and
Bioengineering Conference, 414-417.
Jarrett, M. P. ( 2017). Cybersecuritya serious patient care concern. Jama, 318(14) , 1319-1320.
Kruse, C. S., Frederick, B., Jacobson, T., & Monticone, D. K. (2017). Cybersecurity in
healthcare: A systematic review of modern threats and trends. Technology and Health
Care, 25(1), 1-10.
Martin, G., Martin, P., Hankin, C., & Darzi, A. (2017). Cybersecurity and healthcare. Bmj, 358,
3179.
Sittig, D. F., & Singh, H. (2016). A socio-technical approach to preventing, mitigating, and
recovering from ransomware attacks. Applied clinical informatics, 7(02), 624-632.
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